Assets and flaws
by sticterl
Summary: We all know how assets and flaws affect your stats. But how about your everyday life?
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Second fanfic! This is just a silly idea I came up with one day and decided to put onto paper. This will be based on my personal customization on my first run of the game.**

**Asset: Magic**

**Flaw: Luck**

This certainly wasn't how he expected he'd be spending his day.

If waking up without any memories and meeting Chrom, Lissa and Frederick wasn't already interesting enough, now he was fighting alongside them to take out some bandits while finding out he was also apparently a gifted tactician; which he put to good use directing the others while simultaneously fighting.

After taking down another bandit, Chrom paused to check on their newest ally.

"So Robin, I see you wear a sword. Is it-" It was then that Chrom caught sight of something yellow sticking out of Robin's robes. "Wait, is that a tome? …You know magic?"

Robin paused and pulled the tome out of his robes. He never had any memory of learning magic, but it was probably best that they didn't know that. "I…believe so? I suppose I should check." Robin responded while sheepishly rubbing his neck.

Chrom could feel a cold sweat forming. "You believe so? Perhaps I'll just keep a few paces behind you for the time being…"

Despite not having any memories of learning it, Robin had the strange feeling that he could use it safely…probably. "No, I can control it, I'm sure. Now, how did this work again? Ah, yes..."

Frederick had been charged with walling off bandits while Chrom handled the bandits coming from the other side. Despite Robin clearly being in their line of sight, they insisted on trying to hack away at Frederick. Maybe they were trying to hack a picture into his armor? Robin shook his head to remove such thoughts from his head and decided to assist Frederick by picking off the bandits with a bit of thunder magic.

_Concentrate. Sense the life force of all living things around you. Now draw that power into your body and bring to a focus. _

Being the official healer of the group, it was Lissa's duty to keep an eye on all her comrades. Looking at Robin, she saw him conjuring magic. She had been pestering Miriel and Ricken (mostly Ricken) to teach her magic; so despite her better judgment, she kept a close eye Robin. Being a cleric, Lissa was already attuned to the sensing magic power. The magic power coming from Robin was overwhelming. She thought about asking Robin to give her lessons later.

_Now bring that focus into the tip of your finger and-_

Why was his nose so itchy?

Robin cracked open an eye to see the source of the itch was a fly. Robin wiggled his nose back in forth in a vain attempt to get the fly to go away.

She didn't know why, but Robin suddenly started stretching and contorting his face. She had to cover her mouth to keep herself from laughing out loud. The situation became a lot less funny, however, when she could feel the power fluctuation from Robin's magic in the surroundings. From what little she learned watching Ricken and Miriel use magic, the flow of magic was supposed to be smooth and natural. Anything else meant something bad. With Robin though, it meant something really bad.

"Robin! Those faces you're making are funny and all, but get that magic under control or it'll end badly for all of us!"

Robin quickly refocused on his magic and mentally cursed himself for losing focus.

Unfortunately, the fly didn't want to leave him alone.

The fly seemed only to have eyes for Robin; no matter how much he used his other hand to try to swat it away, the fly deftly avoided his attacks while staying perched on his nose. In fact, Robin may have been imagining it, but he could have sworn that it's buzzing kept getting louder; as if it were mocking him. To make it even worse, Robin could feel a sneeze coming on.

Despite his best efforts, Robin couldn't hold back the sneeze. "Ah-ah-achooo!"

With that sneeze, Robin lost control of the mass of magic. To his horror, the ball of magic went straight for Frederick.

"Frederick, look out!"

Defending himself from that blast of lightning like any well-seasoned knight could, Frederick's silver lance appeared in his hands instantly. Seemingly doing nothing, he effortlessly deflected the attack.

The resulting explosion then sent sparks flying everywhere, igniting storehouse buildings on fire one after another until it reached the house where the bandits' leader was standing.

Unfortunately for him, that particular building was a filled with all kinds of oils. It was said the resulting explosion left people temporarily deaf for miles.

"B-black sheep. Needs to be put down…" Grendel groaned as he died.

Everyone on the battlefield froze for what seemed like eternity, then slowly looked over to the cause of the problem.

"Oops…" was all Robin could manage to squeak out.

_To this day the deeds of the shepherds have been sung by historians and bards alike. However, historians to this day were baffled as to why the shepherds weapons of choice were logs and sticks._

**A/N: Hm…this seemed like a much better idea in my head. Ah well. I don't really have any ideas with different builds so this will be a one-shot for now. Constructive criticism welcome!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Well turns out I had another idea for this story so it's one-shot no longer. That said, I have no idea how long this will go. Anyway, let's get to it!**

**Asset: Skill**

**Flaw: Speed**

"Strength is all you need! Take Teach's word for it. Who needs skill when you can send your opponent flying with one shot?"

"Au contraire mine bulky friend. Skill and finesse are the keys in any matching of wits. With enough skill, one's arrow can fly thine fated path to thy enemies magnificent end."

"Finnis? What is that, some kind of fish? Anyway, strength is the most important factor and Teach can prove it! There was this one time that a wyvern came at me that was like 3 times the size of a normal wyvern. It was tough, but I managed to wrestle it to the ground and-"

"You're a bonehead Vaike." Lissa, who had listening to the entire conversation, interjected. "If I seem to remember you 'wrestled' it to the ground when it laid down for a nap. If I remember right, it took us a while to dig you out."

"That was all part of teach's strategy! Lull it into a false sense of security and then go in for the clincher! Anyway, I…may have exaggerated the story a bit, but my point still stands; that wyvern was able to keep Teach down by sheer power alone. So my point stands." Vaike leaned back in his chair with a pleased look on his face.

Virion responded by tapping his forehead with his index finger. "Ah, Vaike. Being the archest of archers, I of course have my own stories of heroism and valor. Why, I remember the time I vanquished an entire legion of wyvern-"

"Lies." Lissa interrupted.

"W-well how about that time where I was crowned a world-class archer by the king of-"

"Nope." Lissa interrupted again.

"Then how about the time I rescued and wooed a forest maiden?"

"That was from a story!" Lissa protested a third time.

"My lady, you wound me. What basis do you have to claim my dashing acts of heroisms as untrue?"

"I didn't. But thanks for confirming it!"

"Hahaha! Looks like Lissa got you there eh, ruffles?" Evryone around the table burst into laughter for a few minutes, enjoying each other's' company. "Be that as it may my dear, I am still the archest of archers and can fell any target with a single shot with my magnificent bow."

It was at this point that Robin came up to the three of them. "Hey guys. You've been laughing pretty loudly for a while now. What's up?"

"Ah, Robin. Just the guy we needed to see. Teach hears you're scary deadly with your magic. There are rumors around camp that you can fell any enemy in a single blow. Is that true?"

"Huh? Ah. Those rumors are overblown as all rumors are. But I do seem hit their weak points more often than not."

"Alright! Robin, have a sparring match with ol' teach! See, we're trying to see if skill or strength is more important in a fight and you'll be our tiebreaker!"

Lissa shook her head. "Really Vaike? Remember what I told you last time when you got beat over the head with blunt objects? At this rate, you'll be a potato!"

"Ah, you worry too much. The Vaike's tough as a rock!

"With all the intelligence of one…" Lissa mumbled.

"So Robin, you in?"

Robin was always up for a challenge. "All right. Any preferences on weapons?"

"Ol' teach'll be using an axe and you've got to be using a sword. It's gotta be a man to man fight. None of that fancy-shmancy magic stuff."

Robin shrugged. "That makes no sense Vaike, but okay."

Robin and Vaike faced off in the barracks sparring field.

"May this be a magnificent battle for the bards. Ready? And…begin!"

Robin moved in quickly; wanting to end the sparring session quickly like all of his battles beforehand. As he was rushing towards Vaike, he felt that familiar rush of energy and was en route to hitting Vaike's weak point.

"Checkmate!"

Instead, he found himself flat on his back several minutes later.

"Hey Robin, you okay? Teach didn't hit you too hard did he?"

"Ughh…wuhappen?"

Virion appeared in his vision. "Vaike knocked you out with a few strokes of his axe

"What? But how? I was running at him at full speed with a heavy blow ready!"

The other three looked at each other, then at Robin. Then back at each other again. It was Lissa who spoke first. "That was running? You looked like-well honestly we don't know. But we know it wasn't running. Vaike just kinda….walked up and hit you.

Robin began to blush out of embarrassment. "It-It couldn't have been that bad could it?"

"Yep, it was that bad." Virion and Vaike answered at the same time.

"At least one good thing came out of this. I know now that I can do this!" Lissa quickly got behind Robin and dumped a toad down his collar, then ran away laughing as Robin clumsily tried to catch her.

"Lissa! That was so uncalled for! Get back here so I can pay you back!"

Virion turned to Vaike "So, which is the most important in a battle?"

"Speed."

Virion nodded in agreement. "Definitely speed."

**A/N: This one was based around a conversation in a previous Fire Emblem title. Points if you know which one. Extra points if you know what chapter you can see it. Anyway, I feel a bit better about this one since I thought about it a little more. **

**As always, constructive criticisms welcome!**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Sooo….Hi. First I ran out of ideas. Then I decided to finish up EarthBound to clear my head (awesome game by the way). Then summer school happened. Now school is back in session. Anyway, a few things here. After going back through my previous chapters, I decided to make a few slight edits and additions since my writing felt a bit too stiff for my liking. Second, I added the friendship genre as there's friendship somewhere in all the torture Robin goes through. xD**

**Asset: HP**

**Flaw: Skill**

Robin groggily lifted his head from his work table as the sunlight filtered in through his tent.

It had been another long night drafting strategies. One of several in fact. In a row.

Robin sighed as he rubbed his eyes to clear his vision. This was one of the necessary sacrifices he had to make to keep the shepherds alive. Of course, this didn't mean he didn't hear about concerns over his health from the others. Chrom and Lissa in particular were insistent that he not overwork himself like this. Robin smiled a bit as he remembered Lissa demanded he take a break before she took him and Frederick to do "lazy training." He also remembered how Chrom forced him to settle some dispute or other between him and Vaike. For some reason, he couldn't remember what happened after something was shoved in his face.

Still rubbing his eyes, Robin exited his tent, intending to head to the practice area to wake himself up.

"Comin' at ya Robin!"

Instead he got a practice axe to the face that knocked him to the ground with little more than a bruise on his head and tears down his eyes from the pain.

"Gar har har! Robin, if you want to be the Vaike's pupil, you gotta do better than that!"

Robin decided to humor Vaike. "Oh darn. I guess I'll never be able to live up to the standards of the great Teach. Guess you'll have to stop trying to scout me." Robin sighed and shrugged dramatically to emphasize his point.

Unfortunately, Vaike, having the sensitivity of a rock at times, didn't catch the hint. "But that's what Teach is here for! To take potential pupils under his wing and train up up Vaike style so they can become almost as great as the Vaike!" Vaike punctuated the last part by proceeding to do several different flexes that Robin was sure he practiced in the mirror. "And you have a lot of potential my friend! Most people would be rather dazed after that hit, but you seem just fine!"

"Er…right. But ah…" Robin didn't have time for this. He had too much to do today. "I wouldn't want to take up all of your time. I mean, you're so great that you should teach your wisdom to as many people as possible. The more great pupils of the Vaike, the better right? In fact, I hear Donnel recently picked up an axe. Why don't you go give him a few pointers?"

Without another word, Vaike gave a nod of thanks and ran off to find the villager.

Robin resolved to apologize to Donnel later and make it up to him somehow.

With all the excitement with Vaike boiling over, Robin's vision was still rather fuzzy. He proceeded to jog to the training grounds in an attempt to wake up his body.

Arriving at the training grounds, Robin found Miriel burning some practice dummies with some excess tomes.

Robin walked up to Miriel with a hand lifted in greeting. "Hey Miriel! Are you up for a bit of sparring practice? Gotta wake up the ol' body!"

"Ah greetings Robin. Excellent morning is it not? In regards to your question, I find the engagement in combat simulation to create the sensation of muscle memory related thereof to be most agreeable."

"Er, that was yes right? G-great! Let's get started then."

Miriel however, would not an opportunity for knowledge go wasted. "Hold a moment Robin. What precisely did you mean by "waking up the ol' body"? Last I recalled, the status of your body was neither old nor aging. Could there, mayhaps, be another meaning to this particular phrase that I am not aware of?

Once again, Robin had to move things along due to lack of time. "Er, right. Listen, I'm in a bit of a rush today, so how about I tell you about it later?"

Miriel straightened her glasses and gave a curt nod. "That is acceptable. Promptness for a pre-planned engagement is of the utmost importance. Very well. Let us commence."

As the sparring match between Miriel and Robin dragged on, two thing became extremely clear…

Robin's aim was off and Robin was starting to feel like the bear meat they had last night. He was just lucky that he could take so much punishment.

After reeling from a particularly rough dose of fire magic, Robin called a halt to their sparring session.

Catching his breath for a moment, Robin surveyed the stretch of land that was unfortunate enough to be their battleground, Robin could see several smoldering piles of land that he'd have a great time explaining to Chrom and, more terrifyingly, Frederick. Despite the great knight's odd fondness for fire, he had zero tolerance for any sloppiness of the shepherds. Some form of punishment would probably be coming and coming from Frederick and that damning smile of his, that was an extremely scary thought. Flashes of mountains and mountains of weapons to shine with Frederick smiling the entire time flashed through his head. Robin shuddered involuntarily.

Having taken no damage during the entire session, Miriel was the first to speak up. "Robin, reviewing the flow of our sparring session shows that your attacks, while having superb timing and execution, shows an extremely underwhelming result in their accuracy. Is there something that ails you?"

Robin quickly collected himself. "Ah, it's nothing really. Just a bit of blurred vision from being overworked so much. It's been like this since this morning, but I'm sure it'll go away in time."

"Fascinating. Your explanation for your accuracy is that you are fatigued and your eyes need more time to revert to normal conditions, correct? However, observations of the other shepherds have yielded results that suggests that this condition fades upon the first few minutes of activity. This requires further testing and observation." Miriel then proceeded to ignore Robin and mutter to herself.

Listening to her muse to herself for a moment, Robin could hear the words "Trials" and "variables". This gave Robin a bad feeling, but he had to push those ill tidings away and get to the rest of his work for the day. "Thanks for the sparring lesson Miriel. I've gotta get to my work for the day. See you around." Seeing Miriel had become lost to the world, Robin shrugged and walked towards the war tent for a strategy meeting with Chrom and Frederick.

It had been a long day. Not only had Robin had to finish the huge mountain of work he had that day, but not only did he have to shine the weapons due to punishment for destroying the training area, but he also had to remove every pebble around the campsite; particularly those around Chrom. To say that this was exhausting was understatement. It was bad enough that he had to do the task in the first place, but to receive instruction on "the proper handling and disposal of pebbles" with the usual Frederick charm was a bit overkill in his opinion.

Robin sighed and entered his tent, ready to just flop onto his bed and forget about the events of the day.

Instead, he found several copies of Frederick's morale posters plastered around his tent.

"Gyaaah!" Robin could have sworn he felt his heart stop as he fell backwards in terror at the sight before him. Hyperventilating, Robin attempted to control his breathing.

"Fascinating results. Reaction to intensive enugh stimuli produces the expected reaction." Miriel emerged from behind Robin's tent writing in a notebook. "Enlighten me Robin: how many of the posters could you see clearly in the vicinity of your tent?"

"Miriel! What the heck did you do my tent?! How did you even get all of those posters anyway?!"

Miriel adjusted her glasses; completely unfazed by Robin's shouting. "Irrelevent. But since you inquire as to how I ascertained this poster, I stored it upon my discovery of the objects in my tent for use in possible experiments. More importantly, your response was very enlightening. Plural use of the word poster indicate multiple viewings. Further testing is required on the extraordinary condition of your eyesight."

Sighing, Robin just shook his head and steeled himself for the monumental task set before him. He was too tired to deal with Miriel at the moment and hoped that this would all blow over soon. Hopefully without any danger to his life; mentally or physically.

Unfortunately for Robin, this was Miriel he was dealing with.

Over the next couple of days, Robin was bombarded with several of Miriel's experiments that he could swear shaved a few years off his life every time it happened. Robin decided to draw the line when Miriel proceeded one day to throw figs at him (for some reason, this was the one that bothered him the second most) and went to the healers' tent to get his eyes checked like he should have done in the first place.

Waiting for him at the entrance was Lissa.

"Hey Robin! I heard about your recent...time spent together with Miriel and why you're here!" Despite Lissa sounding concerned for his well-being, It wasn't difficult to hear her doing a very poor job of holding back her laughter.

Due to the events of the past few days, Robin could only nod tiredly and walk into the tent.

As Robin sat down into the examination table, Lissa proceeded to get ready to do a checkup of his body.

"Oh, by the way Robin. Do you know what these are?" She proceeded to show Robin two small plastic circles balanced on her fingers. "We found them by your tent and holy wow are they amazing! They can make everything huge!"

**A/N: So here's a super long chapter to make up for the long absence. I hope that it was up to the standards of my other chapters and that I made a decent portrayal of Miriel. Admittedly, I didn't know what direction this chapter would take, but it was a lot of fun to write! Anyway, any constructive criticisms are welcome as always!**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hooly cow it's been a long time. I…really don't have a reason other than life really. But that's not what you want to read so on with the chapter!**

**Asset: Magic**

**Flaw: Strength**

The war was over. Gangrel had been slain and the plans for the reconstruction of Ylisse and Plegia were underway. The shepherds were making their triumphant return to Ylisse to live a life of peace.

Said triumphant return was however diminished by the blistering heat of the Plegian deserts. Most people would have abandoned all notions of work and stayed in.

Frederick, however, was not most people.

Waking up early, Frederick went about his daily routine faster than usual. Today, he had an important meeting to attend to.

Heading to the training yard, Frederick saw his protége waiting for him.

"Ah, Robin. Prompt as always. Excellent. Shall we begin?"

"Hey there Frederickson. Ready whenever you are."

A frown flashed across Frederick's face before quickly being replaced by his usual knightly stoicism. "I believe I requested that you not refer to me by such ridiculous names."

Robin stared for a second before breaking out into laughter. "Ah, sorry about that Frederick. Didn't mean to call you that. Since the war ended, I've had a bit more time on my hands. So I decided to read one of the books I borrowed from Sumia and stayed up far too late reading it." On mentioning the book, Robin got excited. "Do you want to hear about it? It was about a mercenary band who get dragged into this huge war between two warring-"

Frederick cleared his throat to stop Robin's rant from continuing. "That is unacceptable. Any soldier under the command of milord, whether in times of peace or war, must be in top condition. This calls for my special Fantastically Fanatical Fitness hour to cleanse your mind and body."

Robin paled. "N-now Frederick, there's no need to-"

"Enough talk! We're starting with a simple 500 push-ups!"

Robin sighed. "Guess I'm not moving for a few weeks."

After an excruciatingly painful hour of training, Frederick concluded their training. "That concludes today's training session Robin. I hope this training session has been a great learning experience for you in both body and mind."

"I-I'll get back to you on that…after I regain the feeling in my…body."

"This was no more than basic exercises Robin. You should not have any difficulties." Despite his words, Frederick had an amused smile on his face. "Though I must admit, the heat of the Plegian deserts would have dissuaded anyone from any intense training. Your fortitude is admirable."

"Th-thanks Fre-Frederick." Robin paused to drink some water before continuing. "Being able to use magic helps a lot. I can't control spirits like Miriel, Ricken and Thaja can, but I can recite the chants for wind magic from memory well enough to keep cool and clear the sand."

"Impressive indeed. Make sure to keep yourself hydrated and let your body relax. Dismissed."

As Robin prepared to leave, Frederick began the mechanical task of making sure that everything was in order.

As Frederick was inspecting the training yard, he could hear bits and pieces of Robin mumbling.

"Strong enough...prepared….in secret…"

Though Robin was proven to be trustworthy during the war against Gangrel, Frederick could not help himself from being suspicious of the tactician. Though Frederick hadn't finished inspecting the training yard, he decided that ensuring the safety of his charges was far more important and discreetly followed behind Robin and left the training grounds.

Following the tactician, Frederick was led into a dense forest quite a ways away from the campsite. Unfortunately, Frederick was sidetracked by a particularly dangerous looking set of pebbles that he knew were on the shepherd's path home. It wasn't a complete loss however, as he found an entire 6 gold on the ground.

Once he had finished this task, he set about tracking down Robin again. It was at that moment that Frederick heard shouting and ran towards the source.

Upon reaching the source of the shouting, Frederick found Robin swinging around an armourslayer wildy.

"I am Robin! Second in command chief tactician of the Ylissian royal army! Hear my name and tremble!" It was at this point that Robin turned around and saw Frederick.

A long moment passed. Then another. And another.

Frederick smirked and crossed his arms. "Hello Robin. Mind telling me what you were doing?"

Robin quickly dropped the sword and quickly tried to come up with an explanation. "Ah..um..yes. This is…training! Yes, training."

"Oh?" Frederick raised a skeptical eyebrow. "I suppose shouting like a lunatic counts as training?"

"Er, um….yes! It's….scientifically been proven by….scientists….that asserting your dominance increases battle proficiency. I was training so far away so as not to disturb anyone"

A long moment passed as Frederick scrutinized Robin with that piercing gaze of his.

"My apologies Robin. Your mumbling seemed most suspicious. My duty as the shield of Ylisse bounds me to investigate any such activity you understand."

"N-no problem Fredrick. Head back to camp and I'll follow you after I finish my training."

Frederick nodded and started to return to camp but stopped after a second and turned around.

"So…what's next in your training regiment?"

"Well..next I'm going to bind two armorslayers together and try out the moves of the hero of the blue flames and…." Robin facepalmed. "….And is there any chance of you forgetting what I just said?"

Frederick's mouth twitched into a slight smirk. "Not a chance."

**A/N: I wanted to try writing these with gender-neutral pronouns. Turns out, that was too hard. Not doing it again. As for this chapter, it was an idea I've had for a while but I had a hard time trying to make it work and flow well. Also, for those who haven't played a fire emblem game before awakening, weapons had weight values and armourslayers were one of the heaviest swords. Let me know what you think and thanks for reading!**


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